ISP Wins $2.6M Judgement Against Spammers

California based ISP Asis Internet Services won their lawsuit against a group of spammers and was awarded a $2.6 million judgment.  Asis sued a company called Find a Quote after being hit with nearly 25,000 spam messages from them. They said dealing with the flood of spam cost them money, time, and business. They asked for $3.1 million, the maximum amount allowed by law.

The spam was an attempt to drum up leads for an affiliate programs. Find a Quote said it does not tolerate spam and had no knowledge that its affiliates were using spam to get sign ups.  Presumably the judge didn’t buy that argument.

A U.S. District Court judge agreed with Asis’ argument that Find a Quote had violated the CAN-SPAM Act by sending emails with fake headers but awarded them an initial $865,000, which was then tripled because the company’s spamming was considered aggravated. Asis says Find  a Quote used directory attacks and automated scripts to create the fake email accounts it used to send the spam.  Asis said it cost them around $3,000 to process the spam.

It’s not likely Asis will ever see any of that $2.6 million. Find a Quotes website has vanished and there is no contact info available. They’ve had no comment on the matter and it’s not known if they even showed up in court or not.

Is filing lawsuits against spammers worth it to your company? Even if a monetary judgment is awarded the chances of actually seeing any of it are slim. Spammers either file for bankruptcy or are located in another country and are impossible to collect from.